Twelve Kisses of Christmas
by Merry Faerie
Summary: When Zane loses the progress he's made in his relationship with Ami, he determines to win her once and for all...with a little help from the Christmas spirit and a familiar holiday song. Ami/Zoisite
1. Chapter 1

I attempted a Christmas fic surrounding Minako and Kunzite a few years ago, but abandoned it because it wouldn't have been ready by the 25th. I started _this_ endeavor knowing it wouldn't be done by Christmas; instead I'm shooting for New Year's. Anyway, I have yet to decide how the story will be broken up in terms of chapters but tentatively bank on a total of anywhere between 5-7 chapters.

Without further ado, ladies and gentlemen, I give you _Twelve Days of Christmas, _loosely based, as you may have guessed, on that same holiday tune.

* * *

"Ami!"

The dark-haired beauty turned at the sound of her name, only to see a wild-looking young man rushing towards her. Just when she'd decided she should duck out of the way—unless she _wanted_ a head-on collision—Zane slid to a stop.

Strike that—he _tried _to slide to a stop.

Funny thing about winter, though, is that sometimes the temperature drops to 0 degrees Celsius or below. And as Ami had learned from her first general chemistry book—a gift on her fifth birthday—water tends to freeze at 0 degrees Celsius. That, oddly enough, included water on the street. Maybe Zane's first chemistry book had overlooked this bit of trivia?

"Oomph!" Ami gasped as Zane's hard, masculine form crashed into hers. For a second, she managed to grab onto the railing of the stairs she'd begun to climb. But she discovered that the railing, too, chemistry be cursed, was coated with ice, and it slipped from her gloved grasp.

With a 'thunk' Ami's behind landed on an icy stair, followed soon after by the rest of her body as well as Zane's.

"Ouch. Hi." The gleam of Zane's teeth reflected the shine of the snow, making for a literally dazzling smile. "Did you see that it's snowing?"

Ami's snow-powdered eyelashes fluttered in disbelief. "Is that why you ran at me like a maniac? To tell me that?"

"Mmhmm. Hey, I've never seen snow before!" he said in his defense. "New Zealand isn't exactly a winter wonderland." His handsome face lit up boyishly as it hovered over hers. The gold-green eyes she'd come to love flicked every which way, watching the snowflakes descend upon Juuban.

An unladylike groan escaped Ami. "I don't know how Usagi and Mamoru managed it."

"What?"

"Making their daily collisions look so graceful. That certainly didn't _feel_ at all pleasant or staged."

"What do you mean 'staged'?" Zane inquired as he pushed himself up, only to slither back onto Ami. "Ah! Sorry!"

"Staged as in…well Usagi admitted that once she started liking Mamoru, she purposefully ran into him…" Ami trailed off as she realized what she appeared to be suggesting.

"I can't say I object to lying on a warm body on a day like this…come to think of it, I'd rather lie on top of you than any other five foot, blue-haired girl I know." He grinned once more and she wished he _would_ get off since she felt sure he could feel her heartbeat speed up. "Do you think I did it on purpose?"

"No, no, it was clearly an accident…I just….could you please get off me?" Ami begged, a pink blush flooding her face.

"No, I don't think I will. Don't look so dismayed--I think we need to resolve this now."

"_Must_ you make me so uncomfortable?"

"Literally or figuratively?"

"_Both_."

His cherubic features should have enhanced the innocent expression on Zane's face, but they only made him look more like a naughty boy. "I only want to solve this dilemma of yours, Ami."

"I don't have any dilemmas except the presence of your very heavy body on mine!" she spluttered, hoping to wound his ego with the fat joke. He refused to fall for it, though for a second, an offended arch came into his eyebrow.

"If I staged it then that must mean I'm attracted to you, no?"

Poor Ami futilely pushed Zane's shoulders, but they didn't budge. "But you didn't do it on purpose, of course. I didn't mean to make that connection—"

"You're wrong, though. I did do it on purpose. Now how do you feel about that?"

"I still feel uncomfortable, surprise, surprise," Ami murmured, though her mind had fuzzed over at Zane's admission.

"Don't you feel flattered in the least bit?"

"I…"

"Yes, attracted to you I certainly am. But is there something more?" Unknowingly, Ami held her breath. "We may never know." Zane's arms crept on either side of her, only to successfully push him off her body and to a stand.

_Tease._

Ah, good, her mind had turned back on. If only she could get it to shut up again.

Zane offered her a hand and hefted her up, then proceeded to brush her coat free of snow in a motherly fashion. "Zane…"

"Hmm?" He paused to swipe his fingers down the length of her hair, allegedly to rid it of ice crystals.

"Never mind." Her gaze fell to the iced pavement. The scrap of newspaper on the ground. The fire hydrant. Anywhere but his own gaze.

"Hey." Her traitorous eyes lifted to rest upon his green ones. His crinkled at the corners, and she jealously wondered how he'd managed to garner more than his fair share of charm. In that moment, her senses magnified all sounds, all smells, all touches. His breath hot on her neck as he lowered his head, mouth inching towards her lips. The crisp smell of his cologne, one she'd never been able to pinpoint. The sound of his heart racing…or was that hers? His hand sliding to the side of her neck. She inclined her head slightly, allowed her eyelids to fall shut. Shyly, she pressed her lips against his.

Something was wrong. For a split second she thought his mouth was yielding to hers, but then it froze up and his lips _pursed up_. What the…? He boomeranged back to his original position, lips and all, eyes slightly wide.

"Uh…I actually was leaning down to, um, clean the ice off your scarf." He coughed uncomfortably and avoided her blue gaze. "Sorry, I thought you knew…"

She felt physically incapable of making any sound. So instead of trying, she gave an infinitesimal nod, whirled around, and ran up the steps that led to her college dorm building as quickly as humanly possible.

* * *

Soothingly, her pig-tailed friend patted Ami's shoulder. "Oh, Ami, I'm so sorry."

"It was utterly humiliating," Ami said in an even quieter voice than usual. Both she and her roommate sat on her bed, Usagi facing Ami's profile as the blue-haired girl stared at the opposite wall and the peeling wallpaper "Probably the most embarrassing moment of my life."

"Oh, I'm sure there've been worse. I mean, uh, you're exaggerating!"

Ami sighed. "No. I honestly thought he c—never mind. I don't have any experience with this kind of thing, really. It was a lesson."

A grimace appeared on Usagi's face. "A lesson that taught you that you can definitely do better than Zane. I admit that when Mamoru located him and the other Shitennou last year, I thought you all had maybe found your own soul mates. But none of the other girls has fallen in love with a Shitennou. You two are the closest…were the closest," Usagi corrected hurriedly.

Ami shook her head. "Flirt he might, but it never meant anything. I can't believe I was silly enough to think it did." Usagi's patting had turned into a comforting rubbing of the arm.

"Ami, sure it was a little awkward, but maybe you shouldn't completely dismiss him."

The petite girl stood and opened a window, allowing the oblivious winter chill to fly into the room. Usagi shivered, but wisely remained silent. Ami meanwhile inhaled shakily, filling her lungs and empty heart with equally empty air. "Zane and I are just friends. If that," she added with quiet despair.

* * *

"Do the people of New Zealand have a term for 'fucking idiot'? If they do, I'm sure you've learned to answer to it like you would your given name." With that, Nevan rolled up his copy of the Juuban Daily and swatted Zane viciously in the head. The golden-haired Shitennou did not protest. He only slumped further down in the café's mahogany chair.

"I lost my head."

"If by 'head' you mean 'brains' then yes, my friend, you did! You two were SO close. What the hell were you thinking?"

"Please tell us, Zane. Not that you _were_ thinking," Jed tagged on. "Why wouldn't you kiss her back? Correct me if I'm wrong, but haven't you been fa-la-la'ing around here for days because you're in love? It's always 'Ami this' or 'Ami that.'"

"What is _wrong_ with you?" Nevan asked, still stunned.

All of a sudden, Zane got to his feet. "I'll fix it."

Jed nodded his blonde head. "You better. You didn't answer my question, though."

"I'll see you guys later." That said, Zane strutted out the front door of the university cafe, his face so intensely determined that Nevan and Jed lost some of their skepticism.

* * *

What now, Zane? Will you make up for your mistake? Tune in to find out! And please review!!


	2. Chapter 2

---

A Partridge in a Pear Tree

---

"Go on a what?"

"A picnic."

Kunthan's silvery-green eyes darted in the direction of the window to ensure that yes, indeed, snow rested on every exposed surface, from the tree boughs to the mailbox. His gaze then returned to look uncertainly at his best friend. He was up for giving Zane the benefit of the doubt, but had this Ami business driven him completely...

"I'm not crazy, Kunthan. Unless crazy in love counts."

His friend blinked. "That was obscenely corny, if you don't mind my saying."

Kunthan would never discover if Zane did mind, because the blonde pointedly ignored the comment. "You didn't answer my question."

"Go on a picnic?"

"That's what I said."

"Mm. I hoped it was my imagination. When you say picnic, do you mean outside?"

"In a sense."

Cautiously, Kunthan asked: "When?"

"Monday afternoon at around one."

Kunthan frowned. "Who else is going?"

"Me, Mamoru, Usagi, and..."

"Ami."

"Possibly."

"Don't give me that. This is about her."

"Possibly."

Kunthan sighed. "Alright. So you need me to do something."

"Possibly."

"Do you have some elaborate plan?"

"Well..."

Kunthan raised his eyebrows. "Not yet? Well that's a surprise."

"I'm working on it."

"Famous last words, my friend. Where is this doomed Christmas picnic taking place?"

Zane grinned. "That's where you come in."

---

Ami stared at the floor hard, hoping for it to swallow her up so she wouldn't have to meet the hurt, confused look on her roommate's face.

"Ami, you're not serious?"

She tilted her chin up a little defiantly. "I'd been planning to do it in the summer, but with my mother gone out of the country on her Doctors Without Borders project for the next few

months, I think it would be better to do it this semester."

"But Ami, study abroad? For five months?"

She nodded.

"Isn't it too late to apply for all that? Housing and whatnot?" Usagi asked hopefully. Ami was the only one of their "inseparable" group of five attending University with Usagi, their other

friends having gone out of town for their college educations. And although she had plenty of friends remaining, to lose Ami for a whole semester without warning was upsetting, to say the least.

Ami shook her head. "They had a girl drop out of the program, so it was actually the University that approached me about it last week."

"And you said yes?"

She nodded again. "I gave it a lot of thought, of course." And she had. "But yes, it's all confirmed."

"But..." A marked crease had appeared between Usagi's brows. In a softer voice, she said: "Ami, you can't run away from this."

Her friend's lips pursed up. "I know. I'm not running away, but I feel like I need to get away and do things that are important to me. Regain perspective, you know?"

The blonde nodded slowly. She then squeezed the small hand that rested on her desk top. "Your friends are important, too."

"Of course they are," Ami asserted. "You and the other girls mean everything to me, Usagi. And I'm so sorry to spring this on you. But though it was a kind of rash thing to do, I think it's best," she said in a vague tone meant to comfort herself more than it was meant to comfort Usagi.

Usagi lowered her gaze and they were both quiet for a few minutes. Finally, she said: "I'll miss you a lot." She hugged her roommate close and Ami smiled slightly, sadly.

"I'll miss you, too, Usagi."

The blonde pulled away and asked the question remaining. "When do you leave?"

"January sixth."

---

"I hope you realize just how much trouble I could get in for this."

"Kunthan, I'm doing you a favor. You need some excitement in your life."

"Breaking and entering is not my idea of excitement."

Zane shook his head. "You closeted, sheltered man. But what do you mean breaking and entering? I thought you had the key."

"Which I had to steal, thank you very much. Here you go." He lay it in Zane's palm grudgingly.

"Thanks. Well, let's get to it. Merry Christmas!" Zane cheerfully said in greeting to Mamoru and Usagi. Mamoru responded in kind, but Usagi only smiled wanly. The two had just pulled into one of the University's parking lots. "Ready for our Christmas picnic?"

Mamoru blinked several times. "You were serious?"

"Dead serious. Where's Ami?" he asked pseudo-nonchalantly.

"She's on her way," Mamoru assured him. "But, uh, there's something I need to talk to you about, Zane..." He steeled his shoulders as if preparing to inform Zane of the untimely passing of his beloved pet cat.

He drew his friend aside, leaving Usagi and Kunthan alone. The two fidgeted somewhat uncomfortably, both knowing very well what Zane was about to learn, Usagi having told Mamoru while Kunthan was present.

The projected response came quickly.

"WHAT?" Usagi and Kunthan winced and saw that Mamoru had leapt back a few feet. "Are you joking?"

As if she'd timed it, Ami pulled up in her gleaming blue car just then, to be met with the scene of Zane frantically waving his arms like a lunatic. She stepped out of the car carefully only to have Zane rush over. "Is it true?"

It was the first time they'd met since the failed kiss, but clearly he had gotten over the awkwardness. She, however, had not. "I..."

"Ami, are you seriously going to Australia for the whole semester? I thought you were going in the summer!"

"I-I was. But I'm not anymore," was her wordy response. Without further ado, Zane grabbed her by the elbow and began forcibly dragging her away. She was so shocked by this treatment that she didn't even occur to her to resist. She would have been grateful to see Usagi, who was preparing to practically tackle Zane, but Mamoru restrained her. "Hold on, Usako."

"Zane, what are you doing?"

"Come with me."

"I don't really have a choice," Ami murmured to herself.

He wound his way through brick and stone buildings, made even more imposing in their cloaks of snow and ice. The grey-tinted sunshine illuminated their final destination, which stood in marked contrast to its surroundings.

"The greenhouse?"

"The greenhouse."

"But I thought no one was allowed..."

"For matters like these, I find ways," he said shortly. He pulled the key out of his pocket and Ami stared. "This is where we're having our picnic." He rounded on her. "Ami, is there no way for you to back out of this study abroad thing?"

"I...well it's confirmed already...besides," she said, bristling, "why would I? It's good timing, and I see no reason NOT to go."

Zane closed his eyes to regain his patience. "Ami, is there any way to back out of it?"

"I...I don't know, maybe," she admitted, her honesty getting the best of her.

"Will you?"

She couldn't help frowning icily. "Excuse me? Why?"

"Because..."

She refused to allow herself to look up with wide, expectant eyes. What was there to be expectant of anyway?

"Come with me." He took hold of her gloved hand again just as forcefully as before.

But some stubborn impulse in her caused her to immediately slip her hand right out of the grasp. Zane paused for a second, met her eyes, then looked away.

"I guess I deserved that," he said under his breath so that she wasn't sure she'd heard correctly. He continued moving forward and her curiosity and half-shame pushed her to follow him.

The university's greenhouse was home to over 100 different plant varieties. Though snow and ice painted its glass walls, inside orange and green warmth was fused into every space. Birches, tulips, sage, grapes, it was a veritable Garden of Eden.

Zane had wanted so much to share it with her, but it didn't feel as if that were happening. She stood a little away from him, waiting impassively for this big reveal, this surprise that, he thought depressedly, would probably do nothing but confuse her.

Still, he beckoned her towards one tree in particular and whatever bitterness she may have been feeling, she complied and followed him to the pear tree.

"This is your first present." He indicated something on one of the bright green tree's lower branches.

Ami slowly reached a hand up, as if frightened the gift would bite her hand off. She pulled it down finally and in her hand lay a carved wooden bird.

"Merry Christmas," Zane quipped with a small smile.

She returned the smile, but truth be told, her thoughts were probably not quite what Zane had hoped for.

_What the hell...?_

.


	3. Chapter 3

---

Two Turtle Doves (Pt I)

---

Usagi shook her head, her usual pigtails replaced by loose golden streams falling down her back. "Yeah, I'm just confused."

"No news there," yawned Rei, who had returned to Juuban that night from her university. The three girls sat in Ami's bedroom to share a little girl talk before returning to their respective families for Christmas festivities.

As for the picnic, that had not gone as smoothly as Zane had hoped. After the rest of the group had joined the mainly silent couple for food and celebration, Ami had pleaded a headache as soon as they finished eating and left campus. Whether this headache had to do with the confusion battling her brains and the unsettling looks Zane kept giving her, she couldn't say. Usagi, however, followed shortly after and once Rei reached Juuban, she heard an earful from Usagi about the details of the Ami-Zane situation.

Ami lay back in her bed, holding the small wooden bird above her as she did so. She knew, of course, that the bird in the pear tree probably indicated the old tune about the Twelve Days of Christmas. But that in itself didn't seem to mean much. Was that the big scheme? So he was going to just give her eleven more gifts?

"Good plan, Sherlock; just buy me back," Ami muttered, and though Rei didn't follow this train of thought, she smiled appreciatively. Her sarcasm seemed to be rubbing off quite nicely on her innocent friend.

"I vote he's off his nut," the miko added.

"Ooh!" Usagi jumped up from the corner of Ami's navy blue twin bed. "Maybe it's a nutcracker!"

Rei examined the tips of her fingernails idly before contributing her two cents: "If it is, I think we know someone whose nuts need cracking," she said menacingly.

The blonde squealed at this, hurling a pillow at her pure-minded companion. Ami shook her head as a pillow fight ensued, and turned back to the figurine. The sealed-shut beak certainly did not indicate a nutcracker, she decided, but...

She began running a fingernail down the side of the wooden bird. After a few seconds, she came upon a hair-thin indentation. She stuck her nail into the crack, applied a little force and a few seconds later, the sand brown bird had swung open.

"Ami, you got it!" Usagi noticed a second before a pillow slammed into her face. She and the fiery Senshi jumped back onto the bed to see Ami's discovery.

A foil-wrapped chocolate and a slip of paper.

"Exciting."

"Shush, Rei. What does the paper say, Ami?"

The water Senshi opened the paper tentatively, smoothing it out slowly on her lap. She seemed to be doing everything cautiously nowadays. Ever since--well, it went without saying.

Aloud, she read: "Ami, this year we're going to put a spin on the Twelve Days of Christmas. This time, to make up for the Incident, I propose to make it--"

She stopped abruptly.

"What?" Usagi demanded. Rei looked at Ami's face, then snatched the paper before Ami could protest.

"This time we're going to make it the..._Twelve Kisses of Christmas!"_

Usagi squealed again: "What!"

"This was number one," Rei continued to read. "Look out for the rest. XOXO, Zane."

"Aw cute," Usagi said, "he signed with hugs and kisses."

Her goofy smile fizzled once she saw her two friends looking at her with pointedly raised eyebrows. "Right, not the point."

Ami fell back onto her bed, only to remember the pillows were gone. "Oomph. He, um--he certainly has a plan."

Rei's eyebrows came down in a frown. "What nerve! He rejects a kiss from you, then expects twelve of them!"

Ami mentally shrugged, but turned to face the wall. "Well, he's not getting them."

"Damn right." The brunette nodded sharply before glancing over at Usagi. "_What_ is your problem, Usagi?" The blonde was fidgeting impatiently to say something. "Oh_, _I see_. _Yes, you can eat the chocolate," she told her, waving her hand generously at the chocolate sitting on Ami's bed.

"I wasn't going to say that!" the blonde screeched indignantly. "Why do you always assume food is the only thing on my mind?"

"Oh, I don't assume--I usually know."

"_Any_who, I was just going to say that look, Ami, this Hershey's kiss," she pointed at the foil-covered chocolate, "is kiss number one. It's a cute idea," she trailed off.

Rei rolled her eyes. "And so original."

Usagi crossed her legs and looked Ami square in the eyes. "Are you at least going to hear him out?"

Her friend's eyes shifted down uncertainly.

Usagi persisted. "What he did was stupid (and I'm still up for egging his apartment), but if he's trying to make up for it...?"

The blue-haired girl shrugged. "I suppose. But it's a little presumptuous." And truth be told, she wasn't sure this was all in earnest. It seemed just like more of Zane's meaningless flirting, like when he'd insisted on being her "Valentine" in February, or when...she mentally shook those thoughts away.

"Oh, also Ami?"

The blue-haired girl cocked her head. "Yes, Usagi?"

"Could I have the candy?" Pause. "Shut up, Rei."

"I said nothing," grinned the miko.

***

At Zane and Kunthan's apartment a few miles away, the boys had convened for a Christmas celebration. Since their reappearance in the living world an uncertain number of years ago, they had spent much of their time agonizing over their identities, their complete absence of memory, and what seemed worst in retrospect, the lack of connection with any other human being. Their reunification in Japan, the work of Mamoru and Setsuna, had been the answer to their prayers in many ways.

It was the reason, Kunthan mused, he could celebrate _anything_, let alone Christmas.

"Aw, Kunthan, you old softie," Jed called into his thoughts, "Mistletoe?" The blonde held up a sprig of green and ivory from the grocery bag Kunthan had deposited on the counter earlier in the morning.

Nevan, however, surveyed the room pointedly. One boy. Two boys. Three boys. And…him.

"Yeah, super idea. Who wants to stand under it with me?" he drawled. "Jed?"

Zane, who had been drinking an egg-nog (more nog than egg) began choking. "Easy there, fella," said Jed, who had finished hanging the mistletoe. He clapped Zane vigorously on the back. "You can stand under it with one the boys first. I know you want to."

Instead of making a violent protest against this insult to his sexuality, Zane only murmured: "That was only that one time at that party. When I was drunk."

Thankfully, no one heard the comment. Not so thankfully, Nevan pushed the insults in a direction. "Zane? Kiss someone? NAH."

"Haha."

The brown-eyed man put a finger to his strong chin mock-thoughtfully. "Didn't you freak out that one time the girl of your dreams tried to kiss you? Or was that some other pussy?"

"Language," Kunthan said mildly, bringing out the dinner plates of creamy mashed potatoes, turkey, buttered biscuits, and more.

Nevan, accepted his plate willingly, leaning back on the couch as he ate. But he glanced over at Zane, to see a surprising expression on his face: disgust.

"Hey, man, uh…"

Zane waved his hand dismissively. "I'm just thinking. And I _was_ a pussy."

"Yeah, you never told us why either."

The copper-haired man raised a pair of eyes slowly to Nevan's and looked at his other friends unexpectedly. And realized. He couldn't tell them—not yet anyway.

"I uh, it doesn't matter. Commitment issues maybe?" he suggested.

Jed rolled his eyes. "Are you kidding me? Didn't you ask that _guy_ at that party last year to marry you?"

"That was only that one time!"

"…"

"And I was drunk," he added defiantly, before stuffing his mouth with potatoes.

*

The next morning saw Ami fighting to resist the urge to clap her hands over ears.

_That would be childish, Ami._

_Don't do it. _

_Don't._

_Do it. _

So instead, she opted for a tactic she liked even less.

"Minako!"

The girl, who had just driven back from a Christmas of her parents' smothering affection, opened her eyes wide enquiringly. And for the past ten minutes she had been treating Ami to a very high-pitched (as in dogs in North Korea could hear it) squeal session on the next eleven kisses from Zane.

"Hm?"

"Could you, uh, stop to breathe?" she asked as sweetly as possible.

Minako rolled her eyes understandingly. "I get it. Don't want to go public with your future private displays of affection." The blonde winked, flashing Ami and victory sign.

"Minako, there aren't going to be any displays of affection."

Minako nodded. Then stopped. "Why not?"

"What do you mean why not?" Wasn't she supposed to be the goddess of fizzled relationships? (or something like that…) "Because he already showed that he didn't want ONE, you know, in the first place."

Her friend chose to fixate on the least important part of this speech. "What do you mean, 'you know'?"

Ami motioned vaguely. "_You_ _know_."

The golden-haired Senshi shook her head despairingly. "Ami, Ami, Ami. In the real world, 'you know' means hot sex."

Her friend practically leapt back at this.

"A kiss is a kiss," the blonde continued, completely unaffected by Ami's shock. "You don't need a euphemism for it. Especially if you do it a lot," she added, glancing into space thoughtfully, a smile on her face.

Ami shook her head. "Haha, anyway, it wasn't a kiss. It was a disaster, so I think it merits something akin to 'you know.'"

"How about 'It'?"

"Minako, it's not a…"

"Do you mean It's not or it's not?"

"…what's the difference?"

"One's capitalized." A beat. "The other's not."

"Oh." Ami wondered sometimes how she and her friends ever communicated like regular people.

**

Back at the batcave—sometimes known as Zane and Kunthan's apartment—our copper-haired crusader was beating his head against the wall. And no, we don't mean figuratively.

"God. Damn. It."

"You know, you lose brain cells when you do that," Jed offered helpfully from the carpeted floor, where he was playing Nevan in the very intellectual game of Super Smash Brothers.

"So basically, keep at it, 'cause it won't affect you," finished Nevan. "Oh, you just got owned bitch!" he yelled at Jed as his Mario kicked Jed's Princess Peach's ass.

Kunthan, who really was starting to feel like the housewife, called Zane over for some coffee.

"No. Coffee. This is a life and death situation."

"Who's going to die?" the silver-haired man posed the question.

Zane paused in the head-beating to think, but due to the brain cell loss, he couldn't come up with an adequate answer. "I dunno, but the turtle dove figurines I ordered haven't come, and I don't know what I'm going to do."

The men on the floor directed their attention to Zane momentarily. "Birds again? What's _with_ that, man?"

"Yeah, too Hitchcock for me. You suck at groveling."

"I'm not groveling, I'm just...I'm just groveling elaborately," he concluded lamely. "Besides, I have a plan...which is ruined now!"

"So, come up with something else; who says you have to go by this 'genius' plan that you devised in the first place?"

Zane considered for a second. "I guess. But you guys need to help me."

"We're here for you, man. Oh snap, I just kicked you in the girl-balls Jed!" Nevan yelled again, attention back on the game.

"But Mario, I thought you loooved me!"

Zane and Kunthan made brief eye contact and in unison, looked to heaven for guidance.

An hour later, Zane and Kunthan were hovering suspiciously near a video store at a strip mall, outside of which they happened to bump into none other than Ami, shopping with her mother.

"Hi, uh, Ami." Zane raised a hand to brush through his golden bangs. Kunthan smiled in greeting.

"Post-Christmas shopping?" he asked, clearly better able to string words together than Zane.

"It's the best, or so Minako tells me. Have you seen her yet?" she asked offhandedly.

Kunzite immediately looked anywhere but Ami's searching blue eyes. It was common knowledge that he and Minako had something of a history (more like a drunken kiss at the same party Zane had made the infamous proposal), but as Minako had returned to her college the day after, and he had (much like a pussy) pretended to have blacked out that night, nothing had ever come of it.

"Uh, um, no." Oh great, now both he and Zane were babbling buffoons.

"Hi, Dr. Anderson!" Zane piped up gratefully as Ami's mother drew near. The lady inclined her head politely.

"Nice to see you, Zane."

"Oh, Dr. Anderson, do you think I could borrow Ami some time tonight?"

Ami's eyes widened to twice their size. She had decided against telling her mother about the incident with Zane, especially since she seemed to like him so much, but she now wished she had told her.

The doctor just smiled brightly. "Yes, of course. I don't think I need you tonight, do I, dear?"

"Actually, Mom, I was thinking I should catch up with--"

"Great! See you then, Ami!" In a flash, Zane had vanished, dragging Kunthan along with him before Ami could reject the date altogether.

"I didn't know you'd started dating him, dear."

"Actually--"

"I must say, I saw it coming," the woman said with a smile, leaving her daughter in an uncomfortable daze.


End file.
